THE NEW YORKER used his turn at the mike to tel] an environmental anecdote: he had re- cently had a wart on one finger cured by the application of a solution con- taining the digestive enzymes of a Brazilian -rain -forest beetle. A celebrity auction followed, with the stars selling off items from "Y. & R." and "B. & B." 's wardrobe departments for the benefit of the Earth. The lin- gerie Nurse Sheila was wearing when she seduced Dr. Grainger-a leopard- print silk bra-and-pantie set by Valen- tino, size 34C-was a hard sell, appar- ently because Nurse Sheila is univer- sally despised. There had been some unspoken but nonetheless palpable dis- appointment that neither of the famous male heartthrobs of "Y. & R." and "B. & B."-the guys who play Brad and Ridge, often in Speedos-was in attendance, but interest rose when Frank Dicopoulos, a pinch-hitter from "Guid- ing Light," invited bids on the pajamas he was wearing when he appeared on the cover of Playgirl. "I'll even throw in the underwear I didn't wear with them," he offered, and he proceeded to up the ante further by tossing in a personally guided tour of the "Guiding Light" studio, a script signed by the entire cast, and, finally, copies of his Playgirl pictures. There were wild bids from allover the room, and the price eventually soared to four hundred and five dollars. Melody Thomas Scott played to the rising excitement by auctioning off several personally gUIded tours of the "Y. & R." set ("You see everything! Wardrobe! Commissary! Everyone's dressing room!") for four hundred dollars a pop. W e were surprised to find out af- terward that from the stars' point of view the event had been unusually sedate. When the stars of "Y. & R." and "B. & B." show up in one of the world's soap hot spots, they're used to attention. Eric Braeden, the actor who plays the craggy-faced, Continental- mannered tycoon Victor Newman on "Y. & R.," got off a plane in Bermuda a couple of years ago for a persona] appearance and found that the citizens of that country had lined the road from the airport to greet him. Braeden, whose real name is Hans Gudegast, and who once played a German officer on "The Rat Patrol," told us, in the grave tone that is his trademark, that he attributes this phenomenal follow- .. ."'10> . ^ . ., .p ""'\:"" . .. :\. ,' '" " ",' ..J / \\ \ . t f / <J< .. II ! '" I ! f' ; ry! J' , 25 rI ";., . '" "'...,., " <i :{' '\ " \. ..,',. "" ;,,:.,..,\ j . . II #1-1, f " t;Hi " . '.' ". , ; .rj, '..<0 ._' ,) :... 'f "i- ( ;' , . "t1- : ,. /; /f .,. ":', t ". /J J. ,L \'!' , ^ A 4 . 'to'; ..' oCo.4 ?<f( ', 'f' ? .,. .. lit.' .;;.)!/q . J.' ; ":.., ='--- 't,-:::=' I.. t . I! · ./ ......... {' . .' \1, ø 10 f\ '!it,. "The Cape's not what it used to be." . ing to the fact that the daytime soaps "resemble real life far more" than nighttime shows do. "They take sto- ries out of rea] life and play them out over real time," he said. "And, as in real life, things repeat themselves over d d ." an over an over agaIn. E II: vs. I.G.E I N 1901, you sawall sorts of unusual vehicles on the street. You saw electric hansom cabs, in which the passenger sat in front and low down, and the driver on a box overhead, steering his rig from behind, like a tillerman. You saw electric buses. You saw lots of whimsical bicycles-bikes with sidecars, bikes with huge front wheels, five-wheeled bikes for deliv- ering mail. On rare occasions, a loud and evil-smelling machine appeared, . menacing cyclists, frightening horses, and choking pedestrians-a machine driven by a fellow who claimed that the internal-combustion engine was the power of the future. At first, electric- vehicle manufacturers did not believe that a thing as inelegant as the I.C.E. would ever be popular, especially in cities. By 1907, the E. V. companies had started to disappear. On a recent Wednesday evening, an electric replica of a 1952 M.G. convertible was parked outside the Mu- nicipal Art Society, at Madison and Fifty-first, and it was drawing a crowd. A man in a business suit stopped, saw the bank of batteries under the propped- up hood, and said, "Hey. Electric," in a wondering way. A man with no shoes said, "Is that thing for sale?" A bus driver parked his l.C.E. up